I have to admit. I did my research, went back to Brazil and made myself a promise to go further, extend my research, write a book about it.

But, well, I came back to work and the whole thing piled up. My company had a huge uphill battle of, after reinventing its websites, make the whole stuff available on cell phones. Aaaand, there was that little thing called the iPad. I saw it as a valuable mission and took it. And it was such a huge task that hijacked my whole life completely.

The other thing that happened was the sickness and death of my two dogs. And believe me, when you are a couple in your thirties with no kids, dogs are a HUGE deal. So i lost my maltese, Carl Sagan, and my lab, Charles Darwin, in a space of a few months.

So, while all this drama was evolving, the Play Factor became “funware” and then “gamification”. While I was doing my research, there was no book addressing the subject. None. Zit.

After I finished it in august 2009, three relevant books came out. And boy, were they interesting. The first one cama out in november 2009 and is called Total Engagemen, by Byron Reeves and J. Leighton Read. The other came out at the end of march 2010 and is more right to the point: Game-Based Marketing, by Gabe Zicherman and Joselin Linder. The third is the coolest one in my opinion, because it comes from the fast talking gamificator übbermaster Jane Mcgonigal: Reality is Broken. It came out this last january and is an expanded version of the ideas Mcgonigal suggested on her popular TED keynote.

Gabe Zicherman ended up being the curator of the Gamificaton Summit, the event that really shaped the idea as a whole new industry.

Because of a tight work schedule, I couldn’t attend to the event, but Fora.TV came on my rescue. I paid U$ 150 and had access to all keynotes. Today I finally finished watching everything. It’s good stuff, although we are still in the first stages of a gamification process. But what we can see is that it is really evolving and getting momentum. There are startups, legal issues, fresh ideas and developments all the time. The summit shows it perfectly. Kudos for Mr. Zicherman. I just wish I had focused on the subject to help it evolve more. Anyway, seeing the summit gave me new reasons to keep my head on the subject.

If you are interested in the subject i strongly encourage you to pay the fee for Fora.TV (it’s more expensive, now, after the event, but still worth every cent) and watch every keynote. This is serious stuff that will change every industry it touches in the next few years.